Jill Richardson

Jill Richardson, as of May 2011, is a Fellow with the Center for Media and Democracy's Food Rights Network.

According to an online biography, she "became interested in food initially as a way to stay healthy. At the same time, she was working in health care and she saw many patients who were sick with chronic diet-related illnesses. It occurred to Jill that preventing diet-related illness makes far more sense than sickening ourselves with food and then trying to cure them at great cost (in money and quality of life). Jill's first book, Recipe for America, shows her plan to reform our food system. Jill is the founder of the sustainable food and agriculture blog La Vida Locavore and she serves on the policy advisory board of the Organic Consumers Association.

Reporting on San Francisco's Toxic Sewage Sludge
Jill Richardson's articles in 2010 on the San Francisco toxic sludge controversy first revealed publicly the conflict of interest involving SFPUC Commissioner Francesca Vietor and her position promoting healthy, natural gardens as the new Executive Director of Alice Waters organization the Chez Panisse Foundation. Richardson also first exposed that the SFPUC's own testing found a myriad of toxins in their sludge, including dioxin.

Chez Sludge
The Food Rights Network released a major investigative report on July 9, 2010 titled: Chez Sludge: How the Sewage Sludge Industry Bedded Alice Waters. It examines the conflicts of interest and collusion between the Chez Panisse Foundation and the SFPUC based on an extensive open records investigation of the SFPUC internal files. (To view the internal documents see: SFPUC Sludge Controversy Timeline.) Jill reported on this story on her blog in the article ["When Environmentalists Go Bad (and Tell Lies)"].

Related SourceWatch articles

 * Food Rights Network
 * SFPUC
 * sewage sludge
 * Chez Panisse Foundation
 * Francesca Vietor

External resources

 * Catherine Bigelow, And across the bay, Francesca Vietor is the new executive director of the Chez Panisse Foundation, Social City, SFGate February 7, 2010.
 * Anna Werner, Concern Over SF Compost Made from Sewage Sludge, CBS Channel 5, March 3, 2010.
 * Josh Harkinson, |+The+Blue+Marble%29&utm_content=Twitter A Backlash After San Francisco Labels Sewage Sludge Organic, Mother Jones magazine, March 4, 2010.
 * Photo Gallery: Activists Praise Poop, Deliver Dirt to Mayor's Office, SF Appeal, March 4, 2010.
 * Chris Roberts, News Farmers Call PUC's Shit, Will Dump it on City Hall Today, San Francisco Appeal, March 4, 2010.
 * What SF calls compost, activists call 'toxic sludge, San Francisco ABC affiliate KGO TV, March 4, 2010.
 * Evelyn Nieves, Claim: San Francisco giving gardeners toxic sludge, Associated Press in the Boston Globe, March 5, 2010.
 * John Upton, The City’s free compost causes stink SF Examiner, March 5, 2010.
 * Jill Richardson, Food Sunday: Toxic Sludge as 'Organic Fertilizer', FireDogLake, March 7, 2010.
 * John Stauber, Waiter, There Is Toxic Sludge in my Organic Soup!, PRWatch.org, March 16, 2010.
 * Brady Welch, Shit show: What has the SFPUC has been dumping in city gardens?, San Francisco Bay Guardian, March 23, 2010.
 * Organic Consumers Association, The Organic Consumers Association To Picket Chez Panisse Restaurant on Thursday, April 1st, Noon, in Berkeley, CA Alice Waters, World Famous Organic Food Chef and Promoter of Safe School Gardens, Does Not Oppose Growing Food on Toxic Sewage Sludge, News Release, March 31, 2010.
 * John Stauber, Chef Alice Waters and Chez Panisse in a Toxic Sludge Protest, PRWatch.org, March 31, 2010.
 * Brady Welch, Alice Waters protested for supporting using human waste as compost San Francisco Bay Guardian, March 31, 2010.
 * Suzanne Goldenberg, US chef Alice Waters criticised over sewage fertiliser: Top US healthy-eating chef Alice Waters attacked for supporting fertiliser made of sewage that activists say contains toxins, UK Guardian, April 1, 2010.
 * Tracey Taylor, Toxic sludge demonstrators picket Chez Panisse, April 1, 2010.
 * Raymond Barglow, Organic Consumers Association Pickets Chez Panisse, The Berkeley Daily Planet, April 1, 2010.
 * John Birdsall, Alice Waters Demands Apology from Sewage Sludge Protestors, SF Weekly, April 1, 2010.
 * Peter Fimrite, Groups make stink over S.F. 'biosolid' compost, SF Chronicle, April 7, 2010.
 * Brady Welch, The Shit Show's Extended Run SF Bay Guardian, April 7, 2010.
 * Jill Richardson, Francesca Takes Legal Action over Sludge Article, La Vida Locavore blog, April 6, 2010.
 * Jill Richardson, What San Francisco Found in Their Own Sludge, La Vida Locavore blog, April 8, 2010.
 * Leora Broydo Vestel, Food Groups Clash Over Compost Sludge, New York Times Green Inc. blog, April 9 2010.
 * John Stauber, ACSH Makes Alice Waters a Poster Child for Toxic Sludge, PRWatch.org, April 12, 2010.
 * Susan Galleymore, The Green Mayor Has Toxic Sludge on His Hands, Op-Ed News, April 25, 2010.
 * Barry Estabrook, Composted Sewage Stirs Up Bay Area Food Fight, The Atlantic, May 3, 2010.